Ratan N. Tata

Ratan N. Tata

"As Chairman of Tata Group, India's largest and most diversified industrial house, Ratan N. Tata presides over a sweeping business and philanthropic landscape. Tata Group operates more than 80 companies ranging from software and automobiles to steel, consumer goods and telecommunications. With 200,000 employees across India, it is the nation's largest private employer.

"Tata Group is also unique in that nearly two thirds of the equity of the parent firm, Tata Sons Ltd., is held by philanthropic trusts endowed by Sir Dorabji Tata and Sir Ratan Tata, sons of Jamsetji Tata, who founded the family business in the 1860s. These multipurpose trusts, chaired by Ratan N. Tata, include two of the earliest and largest private grantmaking organizations in India. Through these trusts, Tata Sons gives away on average between 8 to 14 percent of its net profit every year.

"Trained as an architect at New York's Cornell University, Ratan N. Tata opted instead to enter the family business, putting in time on the shop floors in key Tata industries. After assuming the Chairmanship of the Group in 1991, he proceeded to streamline the sprawling Tata Group around seven core business sectors. In corporate social responsibility he has given new direction and focus to the Tata Group's disparate activities with the creation of the Tata Council for Community Initiatives (TCCI) in 1996.

"Named Business Man of the Year for Asia by Forbes in 2004, Tata serves on the board of the Ford Foundation and the program board of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's India AIDS initiative."


 * Former Trustee, Ford Foundation
 * Advisory Board, Global Business Coalition
 * Director, Fiat Group (since 2006)